We Can Deal with Rockets and Dreams, but Reality – What Does it Mean?

Thursday. This day started out completely crappy. First it has been snowing heavily here, so my already long commute turned into a 1 ½-hour excursion along the snow-blown front range of CO. Things didn't get much better as I ended up on an incredibly futile phone call with the government's payment center first thing this morning (I could spend 5 blogs writing about that excruciating experience). If you add on my usual frustrations plus a pretty nice paper cut I got when one of my Manila folders jumped up and bit me and you end up with one heckuva Thursday. However, I was just now rescued from my self-pity when the Big Boss Lady called to let me know that she just got $635K of my past due receivables confirmed for payment due to her little intervention yesterday. I have mixed feelings on this. On one hand, I'm ecstatic. $635K of aged receivables! That is really going to clean things up on an incredibly messy account. However, I was assigned this account last fall to specifically clean this mess up and although I have made significant strides, to have someone step in and get that much taken care of in a day pretty much makes me look like an incompetent fool. Basically she threw her weight around and spurred people who had previously been ignoring me into action. I think that this situation can be avoided in the future by promoting me to upper management, that way I can throw my weight around and spur people into action without her involvement. That sounds like a mutually beneficial solution to me. Are you listening Big Boss Lady???...

I listened to Superfly by Curtis Mayfield on the way in to work this morning. Maybe it was because the snow was super flying, who knows. This soundtrack to the movie of the same name was nominated for a Grammy and is considered one of the most influential albums of all time. Even if you think you haven't heard this record before, chance are fairly strong that you've been exposed to at least parts of it since every hip hop act from Snoop to the Beastie Boys have sampled from it (the song Superfly has even been featured in a few commercials, but we won't talk about that). Similar to the Marvin Gaye tracks I discussed a few days ago, Superfly exhibits a strong social message regarding life and options in the inner city. After you back those lyrics with some pretty sweet funk and soul grooves, you end up with a pretty decent record. I recommend Superfly for two reasons: first, it is a great funk/soul album with strong lyrics and second, an album as influential as this one is a must-have for any music lover to consider their collection complete.